Thursday, January 10, 2008

Alice Fulton...

...just read tonight at the Hammer Museum. The space the reading was in was a lot better than when I saw Terrance Hayes read there. Instead of a movie theater type setting, the it was held in this large, somewhat industrial room (exposed beams and concrete).

The reading seemed rehearsed to me. She had very long introductions to every poem and each one seemed rehearsed, formal, anything but conversational. Three of the poems had musical accompaniment. She's been working with the electronic musician Joseph Klein on a number of collaborations (he wasn't there, the recording played as she read). I was very skeptical as she was describing them, but they actually ended up being my favorite pieces. While most of the poems she read were about personal experience and were written in the first person, I found the poems to be impersonal (I need at least a smidgen of sentiment in my poems). I don't know her poetry well and am not commenting on her work in total, just what I heard tonight. She does however have a wonderful reading voice. I asked to come over later and read to me before bed, but she politely declined.

3 comments:

Palladium!I had a conversation with Dean Gorman tonight about how I so often like a poets early works and then I don't know, something happens. And I don't like them as much. Not always but sometimes. I loved Alice Fulton's Palladium. Then she kind of lost me, after that.how's LA? come back to portland.

I was there too -- and I thought the reading was cool. It made me want to write, and I like readings that leave me feeling that way. Fulton's intros didn't seem long, they helped me get into it. I liked the poems without music best. Her wonderful voice was all theyneeded . The audience seemed a little uptight, though, or tired.

Caffeine Destiny, if you haven't read Felt, you should try it. I think it's her best book, one of a few poetry books I read and reread. What she does with language is awesome.

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